With this in mind, the first step in your competitor keyword research is to understand where you stand against your search competitors.

How are search competitors different from business competitors? Search competitors are the websites that rank for the same or same type of keywords as your website. Some of your toughest local competitors might not be competitive at all in terms of organic search. Your online search competitors can be very different from your local business competitors.

Performing a competitor keyword analysis can be done in five simple steps: If you’ve already completed your keyword research, you can do competitor analysis research to receive the most out of your target keywords. A potential customer will have a range of options available to them at each stage of their journey. Semrush's search intent feature categorizes keywords into four different intent categories: Informational, Navigational, Commercial, and Transactionalįor the sake of competitor keyword research, you’ll also need to understand the customer’s journey within the context of the competitive landscape you operate in. To maximize your organic search success, you will need to zero in on their search intent and understand the different stages of a buyer’s journey. Users know what they’re looking for when they enter keywords or phrases into Google search. To start this process, you can take a deeper look at your customers and their online search habits. What is Competitor Keyword Research?Ĭompetitor keyword research is the process of investigating the keywords your competitors are currently targeting and ranking for in SERPs.įrom here, you’ll first need to find out which keywords or key phrases have worked well for your competitors so far. With this information, you can perform a competitor keyword analysis to find out which keywords to focus on next (more on that later). You can also use competitor keyword research to reveal weaknesses, such as valuable keywords they have yet to target. Targeting competitor keywords helps you appear on the same SERPs (search engine results pages) as your competitors. Competitor keywords are keywords your competitors are currently targeting to improve rankings and generate more online traffic.

Keyword competition research